


Containment

by Joracwyn



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:07:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23648950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joracwyn/pseuds/Joracwyn
Summary: Lockdown at the SGC.
Relationships: Samantha "Sam" Carter/Jack O'Neill
Comments: 21
Kudos: 117





	Containment

**Author's Note:**

> Oddly enough, considering the current situation, I wrote the first draft of this fic in 2018. But I thought the time was right to finish it off now. 
> 
> Beta by the wonderful NiceHatGeorgia.

The blast doors to her lab slammed shut five hours ago. There was no warning. One moment she was thinking vaguely that she was hungry, the next moment fate decided that her lunch plans should be put on hold.

A mildly-confused-and-only-slightly-concerned phone call to the control room informed her that there was nothing to worry about, no foothold, no incursion. Just a tiny problem with containment of some specimens that one of the teams had brought back. They were scrubbing the air filters to remove the spores and it would be business as usual in no time. So she went back to work, telling her stomach that it would just have to shut up.

If only she could tell Colonel O'Neill the same thing.

Wait a second, did she mention that she was stuck in her lab with her CO?

Five hours. 

Five _long_ hours. 

Colonel O'Neill, bored and hungry, in a small room full of blinking buttons and fragile electronics, not to mention pieces of alien technology, all of which he absolutely must not touch.

Sam can't think of a more exquisite torture for him, or a deeper pit of hell for her. 

Of all the possible scenarios in which she had envisioned herself committing a court-martiallable offense, she never thought it would be over the fact that her commanding officer couldn't keep his hands to himself.

And not even, you know, in _that_ way.

For the first hour, everything was fine. They pretty much ignored their situation. She continued running tests on the naquadah generator, all the while admiring the effortless way he ran point on the lockdown over the phone. She had always enjoyed watching people who were good at what they did, and the colonel was a master. His command was instinctive. He knew exactly what needed to be done. He knew exactly who was required where. She watched him out of the corner of her eye until she caught the adjective 'sexy' float out of her subconscious, at which point she cleared her throat and turned her full attention back to the device in front of her.

"Yes, Captain?"

"Uh, sorry, sir, what?"

"Did you have something to say? You, you know, 'ahemmed'."

"Did I?" She was flushing; she could feel the tell-tale tingling spread down her neck. She was a terrible liar. "Must be the recycled air."

"Mm. That'll do it."

Unfortunately, the phone calls didn't go on forever, and the colonel had to find some other method of amusing himself. He walked round and round her lab, frowning at the various blinking lights, thankfully seeming happy with a visual inspection until—

"Sir!"

"What?"

"Please don't touch that."

"OK, OK. Sheesh, Carter, you nearly gave me a heart attack!"

"Sorry, sir."

By the end of the second hour, her professionalism was wearing thin.

"Sir, could you just…sit over there, please? No, not there, in the corner. Yes, just there. Perfect. Thank you, sir."

"It would be really helpful, sir, if you could hold the end of this for me. Yes, just— Sir, please don't wave it around. It's very fragile. Colonel? Can you just do what I asked? Thank you, sir."

"Colonel, that is an extremely expensive piece of equipment that requires very specific command codes to be entered— do _not_ push any of the buttons!" 

In the third hour, she shoved a pair of broken desk lamps at him, along with a set of tools, and his hands were kept blissfully occupied dismantling them and painstakingly laying out all the component parts. By the fourth hour, he had completed that task and was creating tiny battle scenarios with bolts, screws and pieces of electronics. She realised he was pilfering actual working parts from her experiments just in time to stop him creating a full war zone across most of the desk.

It wouldn't have been so bad except that while his fingers were busy, he talked. Sam would have said that the colonel was a man of few words, and it was true that he never said much at one time. But one short comment was followed by another, and another, and another, until all her mental space was filled with his voice. 

Instead of being interrupted by having to keep an eye on him, now she was interrupted by sporadic comments timed just well enough that he broke into every thought process. Sam wondered if maybe he was lonely, and liked having someone to talk to. But it would be nice, she thought, if he could be quiet for just a little while so she could actually hear herself think.

Most of the comments were innocuous enough, as he ran through the latest hockey scores and who was playing on the different teams. He rambled on about fishing, and the repairs he needed to carry out at his cabin. He moaned about all the building work in his neighbourhood and the new people moving in down the road.

Holy Hannah, the man was nosy.

Then he moved on to why he didn't see more SGC personnel in town ("I mean, it's not like I'm a total recluse and there are a lot of people working here."). And then—Sam missed the segue—she realised he was debating who would look better in drag: Daniel, General Hammond or Walter.

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, come on, Carter, you must have thought about it."

"Ah, _no_ , I can honestly say I have _never_ considered that exceptionally pertinent question," adding under her breath, "I do have more important things to do."

She thought she'd spoken quietly enough, but his head snapped up and his eyes narrowed. "Excuse me?"

"Nothing. Sir." Maybe she should have tried for a less snippy tone, but after four hours, her CO was sorely trying her patience.

"No, Carter, you're implying that I'm slacking off, while you do all the _important_ work." His fingers made quote marks in the air.

Sam pursed her lips but said nothing.

"Captain?"

She thought about trying to frame a polite reply, but she gave up. She'd had enough.

"With all due respect, _sir_ , I am the one actually working while you're building...dioramas." She gestured to the meticulously-crafted chaos on her desk.

"If you hadn't noticed, Carter, I don't have a lot else to do!"

"It has been painfully obvious!"

And that led into Hour Five: bickering.

Like the rest of this crazy-ass afternoon, it starts small. A few jibes, sarcastic rejoinders muttered just loud enough to hear. Maybe Sam would have calmed herself after the initial release of irritated pressure, not wanting to risk being brought up on charges, but Colonel O'Neill keeps retaliating. It's almost as if he's goading her into it on purpose. 

Who'd have thought that they could piss each other off so much?

"I'm sorry that I've got actual work to catch up on, sir! I'm still dealing with the backlog of stuff I ignored when I was trying to find a way to get you home from your extended vacation!"

OK, so maybe there's some leftover venom from the whole Edora/Laira thing. Honestly, she thought she'd put that behind her. 

"Why didn't you just draw straws with Teal'c and Daniel? You know, loser has to do the catch up?"

And, it seems he might have been a little hurt by that revelation. 

She doesn't know when it happened, but she's shocked to find herself almost toe to toe with him, each yelling into the other's face.

"Is there any chance we can bring Urgo back online? You were way more fun to be locked in a room with when he was around!"

"I didn't ask you to be in here so you could get locked in with me!"

"Carter, I've _fantasised_ about being locked in a room with you－"

Um...

She blinks at him.

...what did he just say? 

He stares right back at her, his mouth hanging open. If his expression is anything to go by, those words leapt out of his mouth of their own accord.

Sam doesn't know how to respond to that. She spends many seconds trying to figure out if she should ignore what he just said. Except, she doesn't want to ignore it. She really wants to know what kind of fantasies he'd been having about her.

She wants to know whether they’re anything like _her_ fantasies.

For his part, he's obviously trying to work out if there is a graceful way to withdraw that confession. She can see the moment he realises that since there is no way he can un-say it, he might as well carry on. His face relaxes into a smirk: the same expression that he'd levelled at her when he told her he 'liked women'.

"If I was going to be locked in a room with you it wasn't going to be anywhere with a security camera, and it would have had much more comfortable furniture."

At the image his words conjure, a fire roars to life somewhere low in her belly. Its heat slowly rises through her chest.

He continues, "We could have spent the last five hours much more... productively."

Sam tries very hard to quench the blaze in her body but it's extremely difficult while his eyes are locked onto hers in that way. Would he look at her like that as she undressed for him?

_Stop it, Sam._

She needs to cut some wires now or this moment is going to detonate. So she gives him an impish grin. 

"You know, I did think about hacking into the security system to shut off the cameras."

"You did?" He sounds surprised, but also a little bit pleased, with maybe a touch of smug, that she might have been having the same kind of fantasies as him.

"I was trying to figure out if I could murder you and make it look like an accident. Sir."

After a second of stunned silence, the colonel takes a careful step backwards.

Moment successfully defused. If only she could douse her internal fire so successfully.

"I'm really sorry, sir, I'm just－ I'm not used to having anyone in my lab…"

"No, I'm sorry, Carter, I was being a pain in the ass…"

"And I really didn't mean－ I mean, I know you work really hard…"

"But where would we be if you didn't work as hard as you do? I'd probably still be on Edora…"

They stutter to a halt, remembering again things they would rather not be thinking about right now.

The colonel smiles and says, "I still think lockdown with you could be way more fun."

Sam smothers a giggle unsuccessfully, looking quickly down at the floor. "I bet it could."

She looks up again to find him regarding her with a speculative expression, but rather than let her thoughts roam into that minefield－again－she asks quickly, "Hey, why did you even come to my lab in the first place?"

All at once, he looks uncomfortable. He scrubs a hand across the back of his neck. "Um, I was coming to see if you'd had lunch?"

Sam frowns, casting her mind back. "No, you didn't say anything about lunch. You were just...there. But I don't know why."

"Do you know what date it is today?"

"Ah, it's... Actually, no."

"Then, never mind."

But now she's curious. She crosses to the calendar on the wall by the door. After an embarrassing moment where she can't remember even which day of the week it is, she finally runs her finger down the sheet until it rests on today.

Oh. It's _that_ day. 

"After Netu, you told me the date your mom died." The colonel's voice comes from behind her; he'd crossed the room unnoticed. "I just thought I'd stop by to see if you were OK. It's been a long time, but…"

"Yeah."

Sam stares at the date under her fingertips, her heart giving a painful twist. She'd forgotten; his presence in her lab and the bizarre situation in which they had found themselves had combined to push all other thoughts out of her head. Now that she's reminded, though, she feels the familiar ache pulling at her. It’s followed swiftly by a new sensation, a tingling that slowly works its way down her spine. 

She had forgotten, but he had remembered. With everything else he has to think about, with all the grief he carries himself, he remembered a date that was important to her. A date, moreover, that she told him once, literally on the way home from hell. 

And he made a special point to see if she was okay. 

She's so preoccupied with analysing the meanings and motives of his gesture that she loses track of his presence in the room. She jumps when he puts a tentative hand on her shoulder. 

"Hey," he says, like he knows he has to call her out of the maze in her head. 

She turns under his touch. She needs to see his face, to look into his eyes. She needs to know that this is not just another example of his good leadership. She wants to be assured that she's not just another box to be checked on today's to-do list. 

His face is soft, concerned; there's nothing of the hard-edged colonel in the man who is gazing at her now. “I'm sorry if I reminded you. If you really had forgotten.” 

“It's OK. I hadn't. I mean, I had, but you don't really, do you. Forget, I mean.”

She wants to wince at her own babbling, but the colonel understands her meaning, however much she might have garbled the message. 

“No.”

"Do you? Ever forget?" God, she shouldn't have asked that. As soon as the words leave her mouth she wants to drag them back. It's the closeness. It's making her feel like she has a right to ask personal questions. Which she doesn't, not really. But he answers like it's second nature for him to be so open with her.

"Sometimes. Mostly when I'm around you." 

Her eyes widen at his confession, the second that he's made this afternoon. After what he's already said, this statement shouldn't feel as illicit as it does. But admitting to fantasies, while not exactly professional, is not this.

This is intimate. This is forbidden. 

She knows she needs to say something. Just like before, she needs to break this moment apart. But while he's standing so close, and holding her gaze like he never wants to look away, she can only bite her lip and will her heart not to do anything stupid. Like throw itself at the man in front of her. 

So she says nothing. 

They've not touched, except for his hand on her shoulder. She keeps her hands balled into fists by her side, so she won't find that her fingers have tangled with his. She leans back, ever so slightly, so that she doesn't find herself leaning forward to kiss him. The camera won't see anything except that they're standing a little too close, that it's been a little too long since either of them has spoken.

"Thank you." 

"It's nothing, Carter."

That's not true: it's not nothing, but Sam doesn't know what kind of something it is. Whatever it is, though, it's too much, and something inside her buckles under the weight. 

"I should—" 

"Yeah, I should—" 

They both look at the cluttered desk. Sam sighs. The colonel smiles sheepishly. Sam waits for him to step away, but he doesn't move a muscle. She shifts her weight from foot to foot for a minute, but when he still doesn't move, she slides past him awkwardly and crosses to the table. When her back's turned towards him, she closes her eyes, presses her palms into the smooth surface of the desk, and takes a long breath. The scent of him is in the air around her. It's exciting; it's terrifying. For her own sanity she better rein in every loosed emotion and lock it up. 

Colonel O'Neill rounds the desk and picks up the phone, but he has to clear his throat before he can ask for a sitrep. While he listens, he shoots a glance at her over his shoulder, so she hurriedly picks up a screwdriver. But the tool hangs uselessly from her fingers as she stares at the chaos around her, trying to remember exactly what it was she was working on.

Instead, all she can see is his smile after his first, accidental revelation. All she can hear are the soft words of his second, much more deliberate admission. All she can think about is how close she was to kissing him. How much she still wants to. Just maybe somewhere with no security cameras. 

And she can't stop herself wondering whether he wants to, too. 

Seven hours after the doors closed, they open again.

"Oh, thank god," they both breathe.

Sam wastes no time. She shuts down her computers and grabs her keys. Then she turns to the colonel.

"I'm pretty sure you owe me some lunch, sir."

"Way past lunch time, Captain. How about dinner?"

"Sounds great. O'Malley's?" 

"I was thinking my place," he replies, as he brushes past her, adding softly, "I've got a much more comfortable couch." 


End file.
